Both are obsessed with process, both search for connection and both seek to answer a deceptively simple question: what brings comfort and meaning to a human life? Those tracks ran parallel, never to meet until Goh wrote her debut solo cookbook. “So it was really great to write this book and finally combine the two. That book, Baking and the Meaning of Life: How to Find Joy in 100 Recipes, recently won the baking and desserts category at the 2026 James Beard Awards. Helen Goh was born in Malaysia, raised in Melbourne and lives in London.